


peur bleue de l'araignee (the terror of the spider)

by softestpink



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Assassination Plot(s), Character Study, F/F, Gen, Origin Story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:40:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22528741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestpink/pseuds/softestpink
Summary: The screen flashes things that she can’t hold in her mind long enough to process. Colors. Numbers. Letters. She can’t focus. She can’t move.This is how Amélie becomes the Widowmaker.
Relationships: Sombra | Olivia Colomar/Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	peur bleue de l'araignee (the terror of the spider)

**Author's Note:**

> what's up this story is borne of trauma. please be aware of possible triggers such as physical abuse, hospitalization, and Stockholm Syndrome. also Amélie will eventually develop a mental split that i wouldn't describe as split personality but she does have a distinction between herself and Widowmaker

**PART THE FIRST:** _[ **Tomber dans le panneau** ](https://mk0frenchtogethpw636.kinstacdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/208-tomber-dans-le-panneau.mp3) **(to fall into the trap)** _

  
  


“ _ Schatzi _ , you are not funny.”  Gérard likes to tell her in their bed when Amélie pulls faces and ruins the romance of them huddled close together under the sheets. He says this but he always laughs. Amélie loves that laugh.  Gérard  only speaks German when he is looking at her and feeling fond and shy. The language is a gift from his mother, one that only she knows he keeps tucked away in his mind.

Unfortunately, they cannot stay in bed past dawn. It’s Nutcracker season which means that every moment Amélie isn’t in the studio and on her toes, Mistress Bisset and the choreo notators are having joint aneurysms. She is dancing the Sugarplum Fairy for the second consecutive year but experience doesn’t cut her any slack.  Gérard is just as busy, which used to seem an impossible feat to Amélie, but now with Overwatch under U.N. scrutiny and Captains Amari and Morrison demanding more of his time, she can snatch minutes of a day with him at most.

“See you tonight, monkey. Have fun saving the world.” she tells him every morning before she steps out of the door.  Gérard  always kisses her ear, already distracted with some new message that Jack Morrison or Gabriel Reyes has sent him from God-only-knows-where.

Amélie Lacroix is almost a legend of a name in her line of work, and for good reason. Dancing, she often tells her husband, is like pulling on a second, more comfortable skin. The stretch of her calves and pop of her joints is a comfort. Years later during interviews, Mistress Bisset will recount that often, Amélie would start a set of pique turns and get stuck up on her toes. Balance came that naturally to her.

It makes perfect sense that Talon intercepts her in the studio. 

She’s sweaty and smiling, in the peak hours of her day, warmed up enough that her blood is racing and her heartbeat is loud in her ears and the music feels part of her. 

“Turn and we want you to- keep your hips open, yes and back into the turn. And X marks the spot, yes.” Mistress Bisset says. It is the last thing Amélie hears before her skin underneath her ear prickles and her vision blurs. 

She wakes in a dim room, sluggish and unaware of her body in a way that immediately alarms Amélie. Unlike regular exhaustion which is a staple of life spent in pointe shoes, this numbness feels pressing, like being trapped in her bones. Her face is half-paralyzed, tongue laying heavy in her mouth. She can’t wiggle her fingers. She’s trying to summon up the energy to test her toes when someone walks in. 

There must be a door behind her. Amélie can’t see anything aside from the gray wall in front of her. She’s forced to wait for the clicking footsteps as they approach and a distant panic settles in her stomach. Her cheek itches.

“Hello, Mrs. Lacroix.” The woman speaking sounds precise, like an old accent is being smothered. Not French. She uses English, which takes Amélie a moment to process. Whatever drug is in her system isn’t exactly helping her focus. She can barely think straight enough to connect the words. 

“Yes, we are acquainted with Mr. Lacroix.” The speaker confirms patiently, reaching out a hand to stroke Amélie’s hair. She crouches easily, though she must be in her late 50s at least. Amélie can’t feel her hand. 

“He’s been playing a very long game with us, but I doubt he expects you to even know the board is set. It makes you the perfect piece. You won’t understand now, but you are everything we need, Amélie. You are going to change the tide of this war.”

Amélie tries to yell something; she doesn’t even know what. The dissonance between her mind and her frozen body is overwhelming. All she can manage is a choked groan while drool dribbles embarrassingly from her mouth. The old woman shushes her, tutting disapprovingly, as if Amélie has fumbled a move in a routine she should know. She produces a tissue and wipes at the tile where Amélie’s spit has puddled. 

Then she sits, quite gracefully, and crosses her legs before picking up Amélie’s head and laying it in her lap. 

“Hush now. When you wake again I may not be as kind, dear Amélie.” Then there is a pressure in her neck and another wave of nausea hits her, a fresh numbness that makes Amélie struggle to remember what moving feels like. She is so tired. 

This time, Amélie Lacroix is happy to sleep. She doesn’t dream.

The second time she opens her eyes in that room, Amélie is so elated that she could cry, because she can  _ feel _ . Her hands and her shoulders. Her calves. The flex of her feet. Everything is sore, but she ignores the aches. Sleeping on a cement floor hasn’t done her any favors and the company P.T., Dani, would absolutely kill her if she knew. The thought makes jilts her mind back into the present. 

She isn’t at the theatre. She isn’t home. She’s somewhere with one door and no windows, no couch, no bed. No distinct physical markers except for the hexagonal tiling of the floor. Even the single light in the room is embedded in the ceiling. She’s still wearing her warm-up gear. Her jacket is gone and someone has taken her pointe shoes, but at least she still has her legwarmers. They’ve even left the bandages on her toes. She isn’t sure why she’s grateful for that. 

The door looks sturdy and has no handle that she can see. Amélie doesn’t even expend the energy of banging on it or yelling. This is a waiting game. 

The woman from before is obviously planning to come back and rattle off nonsense in her direction again. Maybe even touch her hair some more. Amélie makes a face at the memory. Eugh. Obviously, whoever’s taken her is in over their head.  Gérard works for  _ Overwatch _ , a force everyone knows is willing to circumvent the law to rescue hostages. It might take him a few days but  Amélie will probably get to watch him tear her captors apart. It will make headlines. 

She starts to stretch. Familiar movement will keep her mind clear. She pays special attention to her back and shoulder muscles, testing how hard the floor really has been on them. It’s been what feels like an hour and she’s in the middle of working her major hip flexor muscles when the door opens. Amélie stands. It’s th ce woman again. The door closes gently, but swiftly enough that Amélie can’t see anything definitive, just more gray walls. 

“Hello, Amélie.” She’s using a walking cane this time, smooth unpatterned wood. Her grey hair is pinned up elegantly, her eyes are deepset, and there is a scar coming up from underneath her chin that demands attention. It pulls wide when she smiles. Amélie ignores it and folds her arms. 

“My husband will not pay you, old woman. He will not entertain you. He will probably not even contact you for pulling this little stunt. One day, you will just be dealt with, and I will be back with him.” 

The old woman looks at her pityingly and it makes Amélie want to sneer.

“Is that what you think?” 

“It’s what I know, you old bat.”

The hand closed around the end of her cane twitches. 

“Enough of that, Amélie. You will address me with respect.” 

Amélie raises an eyebrow. Soon, she will have enough of this herself. She isn’t usually okay with hitting old people but she’s about ready to knock a couple of dentures out at the moment. The woman is just so  _ familiar _ with her, as if she has the unquestionable right to talk down to Amélie.

“What’s your name? Who do you even work for?” 

“You may call me Lethe. Or Mother, if you are so inclined.”

Amélie laughs, shocked and shrill. This is  _ ridiculous _ . 

“You have to know I won’t be doing that.” 

The woman’s face relaxes suddenly, the grip on her cane going slack. 

“You will,  _ schatzi _ .”

Amélie freezes.

“Don’t call me that. Don’t ever call me that.” 

The woman that she is never ever going to call Mother sighs. 

“I have already let you develop bad habits while trying to be gracious, Amélie, but now I am beginning to lose my patience. Here is your first rule. Listen very well. You do not decide what you will and will not do or what I will and will not call you. Think of yourself as an extension of me. There is nothing truly important that you need to decide ever again, Amélie. Do you realize what a gift that is? Thank me,  _ schatzi _ .” 

Amélie’s skin feels tight with how angry she is. 

_ Fuck you, _ she wants to say, but the second her mouth opens the woman moves and it is so fast that there is no way to prepare for what happens. The cane is solid, thicker than Amélie ever imagined a cane would feel against her cheek. Wood should not be so heavy. The force of it turns her head, a blooming pain swelling up her jaw. The skin there feels as if it’s on fire and her eyes water involuntarily but she doesn’t cry. She is not crying. 

She realizes now that she won’t be lightly kept for ransom. Whoever these people are, they’re willing to use methods beyond drugging. 

“I have done you another favor.” the woman says kindly, while Amélie touches her own jaw tenderly. “You were about to be discourteous again. Instead of allowing you to talk yourself into more trouble, I have given your mouth the task of healing. So now, you have two things to thank me for,  _ schatzi _ .”

She waits, eyes blinking slowly, and Amélie realizes that she wants the words right now.

“Thank you.” her mouth says clumsily. She can taste her own blood. 

“Continue.”

“Fucking  _ please. _ ” 

The cane comes up again, whip-fast, and after Amélie is knocked to the floor this time she mostly cannot believe how impossibly strong this old woman is. It’s probably enhancements. These days anyone can dope up and find themselves as strong as a war-built omnic if they have the right dealer. Her jaw burns now and a dull thumping fills her ears. Her heartbeat. She opens her mouth and it hurts so much that she whines without meaning to. Her lip has been split. The blood spots the floor in tiny drips.

“Thank you for keeping me out of trouble.” Amélie forces out, wincing. The words are contorted in her bruised mouth. She wants this over. She wants the woman gone for another however many hours. 

“And?”

Amélie thinks, blood rushing. She does  _ not  _ want the cane again. 

“Thank you... for making the decisions for me now.”

Something happens to her old, cruel face and she turns soft in front of Amélie again. 

“Of course, Amélie. You are very welcome.” 

It makes her fucking angry that the answer is so serene. That  _ bitch _ knows she’s just avoiding the cane. She’s playing mind games; Amélie can tell that already. She tuts, stepping closer, and Amélie moves back instinctively. The woman ignores it, dropping her cane and kneeling to the floor to touch Amélie’s cheek. 

“You’re going to have welts for quite a while, I’m afraid. A shame.”

She reaches into the pocket of her cardigan and pulls out a jar of something. Amélie eyes it, suspicious. 

“Will you sit still for mother, or are you going to get yourself into more trouble?” she asks, one eyebrow raised. Amélie glares, but keeps her mouth shut. 

“Very good.”

Whatever is in the jar must contain menthol, because Amélie recognizes the smell and there’s a burning coolness being smeared across her already flaming face. It starts to tingle after another wave of pain recedes and then her cheek feels numb, which is better than she thought she’d get. She doesn’t make Amélie thank her for the balm, which- thank all of Heaven for small mercies. The madame simply stands, takes up her cane, and tells Amélie to rest because they will ‘begin tomorrow’. She has no way of knowing when ‘tomorrow’ is. There is no clock. There are no windows. 

Injuries, after a lifetime of dancing, make Amélie sleepy. It’s the endorphins. She’s never taken one to the face like this before. Her parents never hit her when she was a child. Amélie traces her jawline tenderly as she tries not to drift into sleep against the wall. The skin feels angry and hot. Swelling is inevitable. She probably won’t be able to talk much soon.

Amélie closes her eyes.  Gérard will come. This is a waiting game.

  
  


-

  
  


She can tell that she’s slept a long time when she wakes up, because she comes to slowly. Her head hurts and she’s groggy and this time, she’s already got company. 

“Are you going to hit me again?” It comes out garbled on account of her swollen jaw. Thankfully, she’s understood anyway.

“Do you need me to hit you again?” This time the woman is wearing some sort of black uniform. Her cane is in a corner of the room. She is holding a bowl that smells good and it makes  Amélie realize she is hungry. 

“Why would I need you to hit me again?” Amélie asks, cranky. Lethe stares at her and purses her lips. It makes her scar pull. 

“I can see that you are stubborn, Amélie. That is  _ not _ one of the qualities I will reward you for. In fact, it is an obstacle I must guide you through. Because I am Mother, and because I care, I will do whatever I need to discourage this quality. Do you understand?” 

Amélie thinks being talked down to like this is worse than any cane to the face. The woman sets the bowl on the floor between them. 

“I am not being cruel,  _ cherie _ .” It’s better than  _ schatzi _ . Amélie will take it. She won’t stand to hear that endearment again if it’s not from  Gérard’s mouth.

“This is a kindness. If you feel yourself getting out of hand, tell Mother, and I will handle it. I will be much more lenient if you tell me and we handle it together than if you relapse into insolence again. This is your second rule.” 

Amélie focuses on the bowl. Thankfully, she isn’t required to acknowledge the words.

“I’ve made you soup,  _ cherie _ . When you are done, we will go to conditioning. And if you do very well there, I have a gift for you.” 

“What is conditioning?” Amélie decides to play along for now. Maybe she will have some valuable information for her husband when he comes. For now, she obviously isn’t going to get the better of this woman. 

“Conditioning is how we unmake you and then rebuild,  _ cherie _ . How we will give you the gift of control. You have some of it in you. The ballet has done that much, which we laud. But we will take away everything that makes you weak.”

She says it with such conviction that all Amélie can think while she inspects the bowl is that this woman really is fucking crazy. 

“Who is ‘we’?” she asks nonchalantly. There is no spoon for her. She’ll have to drink it like a starving child. The idea makes Amélie wrinkle her nose. Ah, well. Beggars cannot choose.

“Ah. Those are the answers you earn,  _ cherie _ . No more questions now.” 

Amélie drinks the soup, because she’s too hungry to not. 

She is careful but it hurts anyway. She can taste hints of the blood from her own lip, mixed in with the broth as she tips the bowl. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s warm and fills Amélie up in seconds. 

Conditioning is a kind of hell that makes Amélie later on think deliriously that the girls from chorus would probably shit their tights if they knew something like this could happen to people in real life. She had thought maybe cooperation beforehand would earn her some sort of leniency, but the people in the lab coats seem to run on a different system than Lethe. 

She’s strapped down in a cold chair in some kind of lobby with a high ceiling. There are about a dozen people bustling around in the same uniform white coat. They all seem to ignore her except for the ones moving her around like a doll. There’s a bright, blue monitor that spans the wall she faces. The telltale prick of a needle stings the back of her neck and after a few minutes Amélie feels that numbness again. 

No. 

_ No.  _

Time stretches out. Her motor control slips away from her like before, when she couldn’t recognize her arms and legs as her own. 

The screen flashes things that she can’t hold in her mind long enough to process. Colors. Numbers. Letters. She can’t focus. She can’t move. 

Amélie isn’t sure how long it is, but it’s enough time that her eyes begin to burn and prickle and the wetness of involuntary tears slides down her cheeks. Whatever it is they’ve given her makes keeping her eyes closed an impossibility. It burns even more to blink. Someone is saying something in her ear. She can’t- she can’t tell what it is. The chair is a hard pressure beneath her, something that should hurt- would hurt if she could feel herself. There is so much sensory overload. At the same time she is swimming in numbness. It is, for lack of a more apt term, torture. 

She isn’t sure how often she cries or when they finally stop. It lasts as long as it lasts. One moment she’s overloaded and lost in colors and words and sounds, and the next moment someone is unstrapping her and hauling her up. 

“Very good,  _ cherie _ .” That is the first thing Amélie hears that makes sense. The voice is a welcome change. Everything  _ hurts _ . She wants to go back to the room. 

“You will go back.” Amélie hadn’t realized she said it out loud. Yes. Thank God. 

“And I have a gift for you.” 

They don’t speak again until she is back in the room, with the empty bowl and the cane in the corner. There is one new addition. A bed. 

She’s been given a bed. 

It makes Amélie want to cry with relief. The walls have been no better than the floor. She is hurting so much and it’s been so long since she slept in a bed. And that’s all she wants to do. Curl up and sleep. 

It’s a fraction of the size of the bed she and  Gérard share, something a poor uni student would sleep in. There is no pillow. The blanket looks thin and scratchy. Amélie thinks it looks like heaven. Madame Lethe hauls her over to it.

“I have given you a reward, Amélie. Where are your manners?” 

Her body slumps into the mattress, as relaxed as can be. 

“Thank you, Mother.” It doesn’t sound snide, the way she wanted it to, and it takes a moment for Amélie to realize what she has said. She doesn’t tense up because her body can’t with the drug still in effect, but she feels intensely disgusted.

“You are welcome.”

Amélie is saved the shame of her mentioning the slip. She must be feeling delighted with herself, the hag. Amélie wants to sleep, doesn’t want to think about what she’s just given up. Maybe it will be enough for now. Maybe they’ll leave her alone if she plays along well enough. Maybe she will never go to conditioning again. 

She goes to conditioning again. This time it’s her fault. The madame has brought a book and is talking to her about Overwatch and Jack Morrison and when she mentions  Gérard,  Amélie suddenly gets angry enough to throw the book across the room. None of the pages rip or whistle in the air. It only smacks against the wall with a loud thump. 

There is a moment of silence after she does it that brings a wave of panic so fierce that Amélie nearly cowers when the madame finally speaks. 

“You’ve forgotten your second rule,  _ chérie _ _. _ ” Amélie remembers.  _ If you feel yourself getting out of hand, tell Mother. _

“I didn’t mean to throw it.” Amélie starts. 

Mother goes to the corner where her cane is and Amélie tenses. 

“I will give you two choices,  _ cherie _ . You may ask for the cane or you may head to conditioning again.” 

Amélie’s mouth drops open. It’s an  _ impossible  _ thing to choose. Conditioning is a sensory hell that seemingly lasts longer than a lifetime and yet the idea of opening her mouth and asking for a beating makes Amélie insides churn. That seems like the kind of thing an  _ animal _ would do. 

She says nothing, breathing so hard it becomes embarrassingly loud in the room. Mother sighs and lays her cane back against the wall, then pulls a syringe from her modest, black cardigan. 

“No. Nonononono-” Amélie chokes on her own spit. She’ll die if she feels that way again, feels out of her body but trapped in it at the same time. The words she can’t make out. The burning in her eyes and mind. The half-memories that leave her head aching for hours after.

“Don’t fucking touch me! Don’t touch me!” She lunges out of the bed, thinks that maybe if she makes it to the cane she can do- something, anything. It’s a fool’s move. Even if she wasn’t dehydrated and half-delirious from being cooped up in the same four walls for days, she’d be no match for Mother’s speed and strength.

Lethe picks up the cane and swats her feet out from under her and she lands on her butt. Her tailbone radiates aching pain. Another whack, this time on her unbruised cheek, leaves Amélie reeling. 

Then there is the needle prick. 

_ Gérard _ ,  Amélie thinks before the numbness sets in,  _ please come now. Please. _

The bed is gone when Amélie comes back from conditioning. Mother hadn’t seen her back to the room. A short, bald man with dimples and dark tattoos crawling up his neck had dragged her by the arm the whole way, silent and unbothered by her drooling and bleeding nose.

The room is bare again but for the book and the cane against one corner. Amélie cries, slumped against the floor where the man dropped her. She doesn’t even have the privilege of rocking or muffling her sobs. The drug is still in effect. Her eyes are already burning from conditioning. This isn’t helping. After a while, her tears dry up. She can move her toes and the tips of her fingers. 

The first thing she realizes as she regains feeling is that the crotch of her leotard and the upper thighs of her slouch pants are wet. She must have pissed herself in conditioning. It fills her with a numb sort of shame, like she’s too tired to really process it, but she knows she isn’t right anymore. Her mind’s not right anymore. Her body’s not right anymore. She’s turned into something disgusting. Embarrassing to see. She is glad there are no mirrors in here, the way there would be in a studio. 

In the studio, Amélie always saw herself in 4D, every angle from the inside out and the outside in. 

She presses her burning face against the cold floor and it feels as nice as anything. The studio. The chorus girls.  Gérard. These are useless memories. At least it doesn’t hurt to close her eyes anymore.

She sleeps and no one comes when she wakes up. No one comes when she bangs on the door. No one comes when she cries. 

There is only the book and the cane. For a delirious hour, Amélie panics because what if she never comes back? What if she fucked up so bad that the madam is gone forever and she’s now forgotten in this gray little room with nothing and no one? 

The panic fades into a dull pain in the back of her mind that flares up whenever she looks at the cane. She traces the lines of the tile for a while, and then Amélie picks up the book. 

**_Une Histoire d'Emploi Furtif Français et de Tireur d'Élite_ **

She reads. 

She reads because it keeps her from thinking too much, which only leads to her snivelling on the floor again like a child. There’s no author and no publishing company that she can find and the book is surprisingly detailed and questionably vague at the same time. She’s never held a gun in her life, left alone a rifle like the ones it describes.  Gérard had offered once to teach her basic self defense, but she’d declined because of her dedication to dance. 

She couldn’t afford an injury from fighting to interfere with her career. 

The book refers a lot to the importance of waiting. One segment reads  _ ‘Perfect objective completion is only achieved when patience and opportunity meet. Every competent agent of any organization knows this. However, where there is no opportunity, a competent French agent creates one and waits.’  _

It’s a bit nationalist for her taste but she understands the theory. She doesn’t know why Mother wants her to read this. She doesn’t care. She knows she smells like piss and sweat and fear and that she wants water. She knows that she doesn’t want to go back to conditioning. She knows that she wants her bed.

Lethe must’ve left the book for a reason. 

She reads it cover to cover, falls asleep, and then wakes to read it again. Having the bed and losing it has made her all too aware of how hard the floor really is and Amélie ends up on her stomach. Her tailbone is still sore from where she was dropped on it and it feels good not to sit. She doesn’t touch the cane. She avoids even looking at it when she can. It only makes her think of Lethe and  Gérard and  how she threw the book and so now she cannot sleep in a bed or eat.

Madame Lethe does come back. 

Amélie doesn’t know how long it’s been, only that her lips have started to crack and her skin feels gritty. Time has slowed down exponentially. It feels like she’s memorized every goddamn word in that book and has counted every tile on the floor. She used to stretch- simple warm-ups, but she’s stopped to conserve energy. Her arms have started to tire, even in simple poses. It’s been cold too, enough that sometimes Amélie thinks she can see the breath from her mouth. 

It makes no sense, but nothing does here. 

The cane stays in the corner always. 

When Madame Lethe walks in, Amélie doesn’t know if she’s imagining her relief, but suddenly the world is warmer. Her hair isn’t pinned up for once, instead draping over her shoulders, smooth and long and clean. Amelie is envious. She smiles, holding what blessedly looks like a large water canteen in one hand and a large pouch in the other.

“Tsk.” She looks at Amélie’s cheeks and hands and then at the state of her soiled clothes. “You’ve stewed in your own filth long enough, Amélie.”

She isn’t saying ‘ _ chérie’ _ . She isn’t saying it.  Amélie doesn’t know why that bothers her. She isn’t picking up the cane or even looking toward it but Amélie knows the sweet names are important. 

She grasps at straws, her lips forming a word she didn’t think she would ever want to say. 

“Mother.” 

She doesn’t immediately look delighted. Her face doesn’t change at all. The soft smirk is still there, but Amélie can feel something shift. She knows she’s done something right.

“Yes,  _ chérie. _ I am here now.”

Amélie closes her eyes. Shame is a distant, nearly forgotten emotion. She feels gratitude more than anything in this moment. Gratitude for attention. For reward. For doing something right.

Water is given to her. Madame Lethe elects to crouch and hold her while Amélie drinks, forcing more on her even when Amélie chokes and vomits the excess back up. It’s still heavenly. There is so much of it and Madame even lets her keep the bottle after she’s swallowed down half of it. The pouch holds a jar of balm, bandaging, and a small, glossy tablet. 

“If you’ve decided to be reasonable today, I have something I’d like to show you,  _ chérie _ .”

The tablet is in sleep mode until she activates it and sets it onto Amélie’s lap. The screen shows several windows open. They are all articles. Madame Lethe settles Amélie upright against the wall and starts to open the jar. The menthol smell is strong and waters her eyes. Amélie doesn’t process the words on the screen at first. 

Three of the articles are in French. Two are in English. One in Bosnian. One in Serbian. Two in Arabic. There is one in Farsi. 

Gerard Lacroix, famed Overwatch Lieutenant Commander, is dead. 

Amélie looks in front of her. The wall is better to look at. The wall is safe to look at. She doesn’t want to see this. It isn’t real- it  _ can’t _ be real, but Amélie can’t trust her own mind anymore. She looks back at the screen. She wants to forget this. It seems silly to cry over this and even sillier that she must have had some sort of leftover hope of ever getting out of this place. It’s a childish thought, but Amélie feels like the world would tilt if he was dead. She would feel it. Of course, that isn’t how anything works. Not in the real world. 

In the real world, she has seen the same walls and the same door and nothing more for longer than she knows. In the real world, her toes lock up from the cold when she sleeps and the one blanket she’s allowed scratches at her skin when she pulls it tight around herself. In the real world, no one knows she is here. 

“You see?” Mother is saying, wiping away tears Amélie didn’t know she was shedding. “He will not come for you. There is no one but me,  _ chérie.  _ I am all you have in this world.” 

Amélie hadn’t known she could feel this numb without the drug. For a while, neither of them speak. Madame Lethe takes care of her face, spreading cooling balm over her bruises. She cleans and tapes Amélie’s nose which still feels swollen and tender but better now. 

“Mother,” Amélie says when she feels too numb. “I need the cane.” 

Mother doesn’t praise or reject Amélie. She simply stands and walks to where her cane has been laid in one corner for longer than Amélie wants to remember. It’s a strange feeling, to be hurt while Amélie is barely present in her own mind. Soon, though, the pain brings her back and she gasps against the floor, beaten in every way this woman could want from her. 

“I only have you.” Amélie mouths against the floor. She can feel the burning in her back every time she breathes. The tile is blessedly cool against her cheek, real to the touch. “I only have you.” 

“Yes,  _ schatzi _ .” the madam coos when she’s finished and Amélie is one throbbing mass. “You only have me. And I will make you perfect.” 

**Author's Note:**

> edit: this is a slow-burn spiderbyte i promise sombra will be in it but the focus is amélie


End file.
